Now, I know what people say about keeping cats indoors when you move house, and the advice I’ve read online suggests a confinement period of anything from 1 week to 1 month. However, yesterday we opened the patio doors and gave Louis Catorze a bit of supervised time outside despite originally saying we wouldn’t do it until at least 14 days in. My main reason was to give the poor little sod a bit of time out of the dust; the night before last he woke us up a couple of times doing his horrible itch-yelp combination, and, trust me, if you heard your cat make that sound, you’d want to let them out, too. Plus I know every crease and fold of my boy’s face and I know that, when the inside corners of his eyes start to redden and look leathery and thick, it’s because they’re swelling up. 

I realise that others will disagree with me whatever my reasons, but I thought potentially reducing his suffering for a few minutes was a pretty good one. Here are the others anyway: 

• It’s bloody hot and humid indoors and we just couldn’t keep the doors shut any longer
• It’s even hotter and more humid, I imagine, when you’re a black animal covered in fur
• We live in a mid-terrace house backing onto a school, with no way out to The Front and The Main Road unless you cross 20 gardens (and, believe me, Louis Catorze has no inclination to do this because he’s just too lazy) so we figured he’d be safe, plus I was supervising at all times
• We need to start training him for Le Tunnel next weekend and, given how long it took him to learn the cat flap last time, the chances of him negotiating the tunnel into alien outdoor territory are zéro; however, if he were to stick his head into Le Tunnel and recognise the smell of the garden, maybe he would feel a bit more confident 

Sometimes you have to throw away the Rule Book and just do what you feel is right for your cat. And I really thought some fresh air was what he needed. 

So his foray into the new jardin consisted of him racing out and flopping onto the garden path about 2 metres from the door. Then he got up and sniffed a few plants. Then he went into the greenhouse and fell asleep in the grossest, dustiest corner, with cobwebs hanging from above and trailing across his body. The End. 

The next instalment of this thrilling saga will follow shortly …